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Season preview: Ak Bars. Departing leaders, few arrivals and a chance for youth to shine
KHL.ru continues its club-by-club previews of the 2026/2027 season. In Kazan, Ak Bars has lost the leaders from the team that reached the Gagarin Cup final and, on paper, does not now look like a title contender.
Last season
The start of the campaign, by any measure, was hardly a success for Ak Bars. Several heavy losses sparked rumors that head coach Anvar Gatiyatulin’s position was under threat. But the club took a long-term view, backed their man, and was rewarded. In October the team equalled a club record winning streak (11 games) and consolidated in the top three in the East. With no further slumps after that, Ak Bars contested second place with Avangard but eventually finished third.
In the playoffs, Ak Bars again had a tricky start. A 4-1 series win over Traktor was less clear cut than the scoreline suggests: three overtimes in five games are testament to a close-fought battle. But those early difficulties drew the team together, and subsequent progress was impressive: a sweep of Dinamo Minsk and a 4-1 win over free-scoring regular season champ Metallurg returned Ak Bars to the final. Against Lokomotiv the teams traded wins and losses but game five was the turning point. Ak Bars’ weakest display of the final left the team with its back against the wall – and there was no recovery. In game six, Loko opened a 3-0 lead and held on to win the cup.
Recruitment
Arrivals:
Goalie: Vyacheslav Peksa (Toronto, NHL). Defenseman: Nikita Yevseyev (Amur, return from loan). Forwards: Alexei Byvaltsev (Avtomobilist), Andrei Stas (Dinamo Minsk), Kevin Hayes (Pittsburgh, NHL).
Departures:
Defensemen: Ilya Karpuhkin (Avtomobilist), Stepan Falkovsky (Lokomotiv), Konstantin Luchevnikov (Admiral), Arsen Taymazov (Lada); Forwards: Alexander Barabanov (Avtomobilist), Ilya Safonov (Vancouver, NHL), Nathan Todd (Metallurg), Mikhail Fisenko, Dmitrij Jaskin (Dragons).
Top 3 signings
A centerforward with more than 800 games of NHL experience. His final season with Pittsburgh was disrupted by injury, but this is a high-status deal for Ak Bars. Hayes is equally adept on both sides of the puck: as well as his physical presence he has a good hockey IQ and can pick out a telling pass for his team-mates. Amid an indifferent recruitment campaign, this signing is a stand-out success for the club’s management.
A high-quality center for the bottom six. Nobody can match Stas for experience – last season he was the first Belorusian player to reach 1,000 games in the KHL. His key qualities are his physical game in front of both nets, and his ability on the draw. In addition, he will be seen as a player who can lead the locker room – a direct replacement for Mikhail Fisenko.
Another center, and one who GM Marat Valiullin has been seeking for a while. Like Stas, Byvaltsev is familiar with Gatiyatulin after they worked together at Traktor. He won’t trouble the leading scorers, but his strengths are reliability, consistent team play and a willingness to do what’s asked of him.
Coaching
Over the past two seasons Anvar Gatiyatulin built a team that reached the Gagarin Cup final, but now it seems he will be starting again after so many leading players left the club. Yet in the playoffs, Ak Bars looked like a team in the coach’s image: disciplined, knowing when to step up the pressure. It faltered only in the final, the first of Gatiyatulin’s coaching career. The experience will surely help the coach going forward, but it remains to be seen how quickly he can build a new version of Ak Bars.
Goaltending
The only part of the team unchanged from last season. Timur Bilyalov signed a new deal and Maxim Arefyev was already under contract. As a back-up, Ak Bars added Vyacheslav Peksa on a two-way deal, but he will likely start the season in the VHL.
Defense
Among the skaters, there are far more changes. On defense, Ak Bars lost Ilya Karpukhin, Stepan Falkovsky and Konstantin Luchevnikov. The first two were regulars on the team, the third featured less often but played a role on rotation. Ak Bars still has last season’s leading pair of Mitch Miller and Nikita Lyamkin, as well as captain Alexei Marchenko and rising star Stepan Terekhov. Beyond that, Albert Yarullin was on rotation in the playoffs, Nikita Yevseyev is back from loan and then it’s down to the youngsters. As Gatiyatulin himself has said, Ak Bars needs defensive reinforcements right away.
Offense
On offense, five key players left. Fisenko was already mentioned, and he will be replaced with Stas. And it’s still possible that Mikhail could return to the team. But Ilya Safonov left for the NHL, Alexander Barabanov, Nathan Todd and Dmitrij Jaskin have new employers in the KHL. They each played an important role last season and so far they have not been replaced. Even in terms of raw numbers, Ak Bars is short, to say nothing of the quality of the players who have gone. It’s highly likely that Artyom Galimov, Grigory Denisenko, Alexander Chmelevski and Kirill Semyonov will be the drivers of the Kazan offense. We might also see the emergence of Semyon Terekhov, used sparingly up to now. After an offer came in from Sibir, he moved to a one-way contract.
Youngsters
Valiullin and Gatiyatulin agree that the problems in building this season’s roster open the door for Ak Bars’ prospects to prove their worth. In pre-season, Malik Saberzyanov did well, while Alexander Ivanov, Igor Bardin, Timofei Zhulin and Radel Zamaltdinov have regularly joined up with the first team. The latter has been trying to establish himself in the KHL for the past two seasons without quite getting there. Maybe at the start of this season, the talented forward will get more game time.
Expectations
The big question remains reinforcing the Ak Bars roster. Last season the team started with Brandon Biro and Wyatt Kalinyk but both were traded away to acquire Todd and Chmelevski. This examples show how it’s possible to land a big deal even during the season, and it feels like Ak Bars badly needs one of two of those transfer coups this season. Without any significant additions, this team is unlikely to go beyond the second round of the playoffs, especially given the recruitment of its championship rivals.
